One year later.

I can't believe it has been a whole year.

I've always been one to resist change of any kind. I'm rather terrified of anything to do with it, to be honest. Small changes are somewhat manageable; it's always the more important ones that cause my mind to fall to pieces. That being said, moving last year came as a huge shock to me. The very thought of leaving practically my whole life behind, and start afresh in an alien place seemed abhorrent, inhuman and cruel. I surprised myself, though, by taking it way better than I had thought I would. True, there were those moments when all I wanted to do was pack my bags and go back home. (It's rather funny how I still refer to Bombay as 'home'. People never lose the opportunity to bring this discrepancy to my attention.) But for the most part, I managed to pull through. In spite of hitting numerous obstacles along the way.

It has not been an easy year for me at all. I used to be adept at shrugging off stress, but I'm afraid this no longer holds true. Stress has turned my brain into a disorderly, chaotic mess. My mind is perpetually filled with myriad emotions, ranging from joy to sorrow and everything else in between. And there's the issue of worry. Worrying thoughts reside in my brain like parasitic worms; consuming me bit by bit, and eventually destroying me. School, assignments, exams, university. These four words play over and over in my head in an endless loop; like a broken record that nobody cares to turn off. My mind has become like a busy road junction; where things come to a complete standstill if even one such shadow of a thought refuses to move on its way. This often keeps me awake till the wee hours of the night; contemplating, analyzing, reflecting upon every minute detail, until the last vestige of energy left in my being is consumed, and my brain drifts off to sleep.

Much as I'd like to say that I've learned something worthwhile over the past year, I cannot. I assure you that I haven't. I still continue to make the same mistakes; still continue to expect the same things from life, in spite of knowing  very well that the odds of me actually getting them are very slim. Experience is supposed to be the best teacher, but I simply don't seem to learn.

And then there's you. You're nothing less than an infectious disease, slowly consuming every cell of my brain, and you need to be eradicated from every single chamber of my mind for good. You need to be shattered into a thousand pieces so that each piece may gather dust in its coffin in some remote corner of the world. So that I can stop lingering on old memories and indulging in wishful thinking. So that I never repeat the mistakes I made.

This is what I seem to have become, one year later. When will I ever learn?

I suffer from wanderlust.

One of the defects that I've been born with is an unnaturally tiny attention span. (No, I’ve been checked for ADD and I do not suffer from it). My mind is horribly fickle. It can jump from one tiny, insignificant thing to another in a remarkably short time period. Small wonder, then, that I cannot devote myself wholeheartedly to any task that requires a considerable amount of attention and mental exertion (a really good book is an exception, of course). This has its own advantages, though.

When distracted from life's endless tasks by the call of some worthless, inconspicuous (but shiny) object, my mind embarks on a journey of its own. It takes life into its own hands and manages to transport me from the closed confines of my skull to places far-off and wonderful. People often deprecate my day-dreaming and call it worthless, but I beg to differ. My mind carves out an imaginary path so tempting and so very intriguing that I forget time, space and the entire world around myself. It throws up ideas and people that I never knew even existed. It opens up new vistas of discovery and adventure. It permits me to explore its deepest chambers, and each chamber leads to an unexplored realm, silently waiting to be discovered. Sorely tempted, I succumb to its lure, savouring every twist and turn, every dead-end and every detour with gusto.

My seemingly useless day-dreams have taken me to places that I’ll probably never be able to visit in real life (some of them have transported me to queer worlds that probably don’t even exist). I’ve met every kind of person imaginable, been in every possible situation. I've experienced joy, sorrow, disappointment, fear, excitement, and every other conceivable emotion.

The sole purpose of this sort of insanity is escapism. I find it amazing that I can allow my mind to take over and transport me to bizarre, surreal places. I can escape from the stress caused by my ever-growing to-do list, the migraines and numerous aches and pains that I endure on a daily basis, my annoying sibling…all of it, albeit only for a while. These journeys, somehow, succeed in lulling my frustrated, overworked and exhausted self into a state of calm, filling me with a sense of peace and tranquility.

I look forward to my daydream sessions with a fervent, almost crazy enthusiasm. I’ve been doing this for as long as I can remember.

It’s what keeps me sane, day after day, year after year.

(This is probably where my mind will travel next.)

Beginnings.

I never really understood what people do with blogs. Yes, I started one.  To what purpose, I myself cannot comprehend. What am I meant to do, really? Do I ramble incoherently about my pathetic existence? Much as anyone would like to pretend that every day in their life is an engrossing adventure (possibly involving a few dragons), I cannot, and choose not to. My existence, unfortunately, deals with far more mundane matters, like the towering pile of textbooks that sits menacingly on my desk as I write this. Hardly the stuff fantasies are made of. Do I chronicle the little thoughts that flit in and out of my tired brain like butterflies; worthless, evanescent thoughts that, surely, are neither of any use nor interest to any creature that roams this planet? Would I be willing to expose the darkest, seldom-visited chambers and catacombs of my mind to any and every stranger, crawling the World Wide Web, who somehow happens to stumble upon this blog? I don’t know. Yet.

I assume blogging is a skill, acquired and perfected by experience. Someday, my writing will metamorphose into pieces that are worth reading. Until then, I will have to be content with my useless ranting.

I will learn. Eventually.